Hertfordshire Genealogy: Places: Ware - St Mary's Parish Church

St Mary's Parich Church, Ware, Herts, Publisher G Price & Son

All Saints [sic], Ware

Published by G. Price & Son, Ware

Posted 1908

St Mary's Church, Ware

Published by T. W. Jennings, The Library, High Street, Ware

Frith Series # 77118 (1925)

Parish Church, Ware

Published by G. Price & Son, The Library, Ware

Posted 1907 - back suggests date c1904

Printed in Berlin

Ware - Parish Church

Published by Munnings, Hertford

Posted 1910 but earlier back

Ware - Parish Church

[Identical photograph]

Published by R. W. Harradence

Back circa 1910

St Mary's Church, Ware Published H. Coates, Wisbech. circa 1930

The Parish Church of St. Mary is a much restored cruciform building, partly in the Decorated and with some Perpendicular work. There is a beautiful five-light window in the north transept. The font is octagonal and of great age, and, of course, there are numerous monuments and brasses. A stone in the nave floor near the pulpit bears an inscription, partly. worn away, identical to the epitaph mentioned under Hertford to a William Hart who died in 1823:

Blow Boreas, blow; let Neptune's billow roar,

Here lies a sailor, safe landed on the shore;

Though Neptune's waves have tossed him to and fro,

By God's decree he harbours here below;

He now at anchor lies amidst the fleet

Waiting orders, Admiral Christ to meet.

... and the next stone to it commemorates the wife of a Dr. Walley, who died from smallpox in 1762.

The graveyard is well kept, and head-stones are clear and legible. Most remarkable are some of the epitaphs, in doggerel, presumed to emanate from the mouth of the deceased. As an illustration! this :-

Husband and children be content,

For unto you I was but lent;

My debt is pay'd, my grave you see,

Wait but awhile you'll follow me."

A Pilgrimage in Hertfordshire

Ware - Parish Church - posted 1916

Interior of the Parish Church, Ware, Herts

The Charles Martin Publishing Co., Ponder End, London. No 3024 - used 1913

The Font
Clutterbuck, The History of the County of Hertford, 1827

The Font is of considerable antiquity, and is supposed to have been given to the church by Thomas de Montacute.

It was restored in the mid nineteenth century when it was given a lead lining and drain, placed i~ the west end and covered with a lofty oak canopy. This cover proved eventually to be too heavy for the roof from which it was suspended, and it is now kept at the rear of the North Aisle.

The new font cover is very similar to the original (illustrated), and was commissioned as a memorial to Frank Beazley who was a Churchwarden for many years, and active in both Parochial and Local Council, Scouting and welfare work in Ware. It depicts the dove of peace and has been carved from Oak by Stephan Pietszch to a design by Riley & Glanfield.

The bowl of the font is deep enough to have been used for immersion of infants during baptism, as was the custom in ancient times.

It is octagonal, and on each face is a niche containing a representation of a saintly figure. Opinions differ on the identity of these figures, but the three facing east are easily identified. They are: St. Christopher with the Christ child, St. George slaying the dragon, and St. Catherine. Other figures are said to be St. John the Baptist, St. Margaret, Archangel Gabriel, St. Thomas, and the Blessed Virgin.

The figure of St. George is clad in armour similar in detail to that of the effigy of the Black Prince in Canterbury Cathedral and is believed to be modelled on that contemporary portrait. An old illustration of the font shows St. George clean shaven and wearing a simple tunic, so we can deduce this figure was completely remodelled when the Font was restored.

from Saint Mary Ware: History & Guide, 1980, by Dorothy Palmer

Interior of the Parish Church, Ware, Herts

The Charles Martin Publishing Co., Ponder End, London.

No 3023


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